Up the tree or down the tree
Genevieve Kaplan
running along the wire, the fence
through the leaves on the ground (a dry crunch, a deep
pleasure). night comes, along after the day and the weather
is back again, the hum of the distance, and who needs
what I’ll send them to, or when, in the open field, where
the animals are small and mild, natural. they flirt
with me after all, admiring my hair and my boundaries
and my tired age.
in my head, and all around it, the gentle
shaking, there, down from the limbs, on the soil, the ground
in the path where it smells like peaches, green curry, spicy
bay. I haven’t made one, I never found one, I sat still
all day and tried not to let anyone see in the heart (of the space)
of the clearing, the slight wind that stalls just nearby, there
~~~~~
Genevieve Kaplan's work has recently appeared in or is forthcoming from Rhino, Western Humanities Review, and Terrain.org: a Journal of the Built and Natural Environments. Her book of poetry, In the ice house, is available from Red Hen Press.